Used Greats: Ferrari Daytona Spyder

Tony Middlehurst - PistonHeads

Not a budget buy at £2.4 million, but movie buffs will know this ultra rare Ferrari

Ferrari didn’t make many drop-top Ferrari 365 GTB/4s – or Daytona Spyders, as they are more commonly known. It’s generally believed that just 122 were built.

You might have a sneaking feeling that there are more than that around, but that’s probably because a few unofficial chop jobs were done on regular Daytona coupés. Genuine Spyders are rare. Very rare. And it’s especially unusual to find one in the UK.

This one is even more special in that it’s a film car. The movie in question was ‘The Gumball Rally’, and it became the replacement when somebody pranged the first one during shooting. For continuity, the movie folk had to rejig the upholstery, changing the stand-in car’s interior to tan leather and removing the headrests .

Before its Gumball experience, this 4.4-litre V12 Ferrari was interesting in its own right. It was the Los Angeles motor show car before Warner Brothers bought it in 1975. By 1977 it had accumulated 22,000 miles and by 1983 it had been bought by well-known Ferrari collector Robert Toney. After appearing at a couple of American events in the 1990s, the car was squirrelled away into a collection for 20 years. It was sold at auction in August this year and now it’s on the floor of Joe Macari’s showroom.

Any 365 GTB/4 has major pulling power, in more ways than one. Sure, you could find any number of faster, more modern supercars for the £2.4m asking price of this one, and you could certainly buy lower mileage classic Ferraris for less.

But few of them will have this car’s uniqueness. Try to find a machine that would be better for a sunny Sunday outing to a nice country pub.